Bakers coconut and a hint of white chocolate make for a moist, adult cookie.

Whipped together 2oz sugar and 4oz of unsalted room temperature butter until light and fluffy.

Combine in 6oz of flour, mix until a proper dough

Add 1/3rd cup white chocolate chips and 2/3rd cup bakers coconut.

Bake flattened 1 1/2 inch spheres of dough for 15 minutes at 350 until slightly browned.

One more shot for extra food porn goodness:

I love pasta. I love pasta in almost all it’s forms! Having experimented with several types of factory made pastas in the last month I decided to give it a go at creating my own. After having both the King and Queen of the Weekly Geek impress upon me how much better a handle-free rolling pin was I made a detour to <fancy cooking store> in the U-Village to pick up a french style Vic Firth maple rolling pin.

Following the 3:2 flour to egg ratio recommended in Michael Ruhlman’s Ratio I set out on my quest. Things got a little messy at first until I figured out how to properly dust down everything with flour. In the spirit of experimentation I kneaded half of the dough for a few minutes longer than the other half to get different textures. Once the kneading was done each half was let to rest for 15 minutes before being halved again as below.

I obviously could benefit from a little practice in rolling and cutting technique to make each individual noodle a more uniform length, but I am actually pretty pleased with how well they came out. The thick cut reminds me a lot of some of the egg noodles my grandparents would put in their Mennonite soups every day for lunch.

Once cooked in lightly salted water for 6 minutes the results were delicious. The more-kneaded dough came out to my favorite – much thicker and more substantive, a hearty egg noodle.

Check out more photos of the process and finished noodles on Flickr.

The chicken is marinated in olive oil and sun dried tomatoes and was served over a bed of sauteed garlic, onion, and apples with crisp lemon asparagus in the background. I’m still perfecting the grill technique on the asparagus – a little bit of charred blackness is fantastic, but it’s really easy to do.

The biggest experiment for me was the garlic, onion, and apples. I reduced a little lemon juice with the mix after caramelizing the onions to help bring out the sweetness in the onion. The end result came out sweet yet savory and filling. Next time I’m going to put the cloves of garlic in a few minutes early in the hopes of further softening it to better match the cooked apples.

Dessert was reheated from last night – a pureed pear and lime syrup baked over pear and apple slices with a crisp style top served ala mode with vanilla bean ice cream. This is certainly the tastiest thing I’ve ever made and possibly one of the best things I’ve ever tasted. NOM!

Shortly after taking that photo the Apple store closed to transform it into an iPhone 3G store. The first step was the erection of a large black velour curtain of mystery to shroud the store and prevent prying eyes from glimpsing the goodness being assembled inside. Other than the occasionally Apple employee emerging from the curtain to go home and sleep (lucky them) the velour curtain of mystery was the only thing to be seen until 8am graced the Pacific time zone.

Waiting in line
The 12 hours in line actually wasn’t so bad. Much to the horror of the Apple Store the Alderwood Mall Security and Administration announced that folding chairs, sleeping bags, tents, and in general having fun were forbidden on property. They seemed to think that even allowing us to be on the property after the malls 10pm closing time was a special treat and yes, could we ask for another cup of porridge sir?

Aside from having to choose between sitting on the cold outdoor concrete and standing all evening we had a blast. The Gear Live crew came out in force to film the event and do some product giveaways for some iPhone cases and accessories. The night passed relatively quickly bringing us to 8am with a line of 250+ excited people iWaiting for the iPhone 3G.

The curtain drops
The velour curtain of mystery dropped and the doors flung open to an Apple store filled with excited Apple employees clapping and cheering us on. Being first in line provided a larger thrill than I expected – leaving my heart racing as I walked through their gauntlet of proffered high-5′s, cheering iAcolytes, and my own sleep-starved imaginations addition of a glowing visage of his holiness Jobs floating in the middle of the store looking down upon his dedicated flock.

The thrill was unfortunately short lived – the internet had indicated prior to opening that system problems had been making the launch difficult for those in time zones ahead of PST. Those problems had far from been worked out by the time us on the west coast were blessed with the coming of 8am. Due to the glitches it was roughly 45 minutes from the time I entered the store until I had been able to successfully purchased my 16GB white iPhone 3G. Even after the purchase the in store activation failed completely leaving me with a sleek and sexy hunk of plastic, plaintively begging to be plugged into iTunes for activation.

Time passes, the 30 minute drive home ensues…

The first several hours home were bittersweet. On the up side I was home and able to shower and sit on comfortable furniture. On the down side I was iPhone-less. Due to a glitch (which has been dubbed the iPocalypse by our beloved main stream media) everyone transitioning from a 1st generation iPhone to an iPhone 3G had their 1st generation iPhone deactivated during the process, so due to the unavailability of the Apple activation server neither the old nor new iPhone would work as a phone leaving me (and 100′s of thousands of others) phone-less and unable to make or receive calls.

While catching back up on work mail remotely I was forced to repeatedly plug my pearly white new toy into my iMac to wait several minutes for the dreaded timeout dialog to inform me that no, I couldn’t use my new toy, and no I couldn’t have a pony either.

After begging use of a neighbors condo and phone line for a few conference calls my precious toy suddenly popped to life upon one of my connection attempts to iTunes. The server-gerbils must have finally gotten their second wind as my iPhone 3G activated, and the sync process begun to restore all of my settings, applications, and media.

Lunch with a friend ensues during the <1 hour sync…

Finally home, and with a working iPhone 3G in hand the process of playing with my precious new toy could begin. Although a little rough around the edges (more on that in a minute) the experience is overall very positive. The 3G antenna provides fast data – combining the stunning software functionality of the iPhone with WiFi like internet access anywhere in a major city makes for a highly functional and productive experience. The two big new software features – Microsoft Exchange support and the iTunes App Store – add significant functionality and usability for both business and consumer users of the iPhone alike.

Although highly subjective I would venture to say that the iPhone 3G feels faster than the first generation iPhone. I’m unaware of if the processor it utilizes is any faster, or if this is merely a psychosomatic effect, but many tasks seem to execute faster. On the flip side a few of the new features seem to have regressed performance – the contacts application now takes several seconds to load as opposed to the nearly instant launch on my old iPhone. Also in the subjective category the iPhone’s virtual keyboard seems improved, although I would be hard pressed to put my finger on exactly how. The keyboard just seems more accurate and easier to use with the new phone.

Another highly subjective trait of the iPhone 3G is it’s sleekness. While the iPhone 3G is actually a millimeter thicker than it’s 1st generation predecessor it feels significantly slimmer and more comfortable in the hand. Much like it’s big brother the Macbook Air the use of organically curving sides hides it’s true heft and girth from the users perception.

Microsoft Exchange support
Exchange support is baked in to the iPhone 2.0 firmware. This feature is available to first generation iPhones and the iPhone 3G alike. After entering your email address, domain account, and password directly into your iPhone and accepting any domain policies (such as a PIN lock) from the Exchange Server you are set to go. Email, contacts, and calendar updates push to the iPhone from your Exchange Server as advertised keeping any business user in touch with their work. Full Microsoft Office support has also been added allowing the reading and review of all Microsoft Office formats including Word, Excel, and Powerpoint documents.

The iTunes App store
The App Store provides the other killer feature – or is that features. While many have decried the iPhone previously for missing various functions those naysayers have been silenced through the ad-hoc addition of functionality. The App Store allows for the browsing, downloading, and updating of applications over WiFi or the cellular network and brings a host of more than 500 new applications to the iPhone. While many of these applications lack the polish of the Apple built applications a few do have that level of sophistication and as time goes on and the iPhone platform gains momentum the signal to noise ratio will surely get better and a plentitude of stunning and functional applications filling any hole left by the Cupertino designers.

Several of the highly polished apps that have impressed me are Twitterrific, Loopt, and Remote. I also downloaded a few games and was impressed by the general level of polish, however as a general rule I don’t engage in mobile gaming so I’m mostly ignoring them for now. I have a few loaded onto my iPhone should I ever find myself with a few spare moments to burn and no productive tasks I can accomplish (unlikely with an iPhone in hand).

Location based services
While the built in A-GPS service was far from my most anticipated feature of the iPhone 3G it’s instantly grown on me. I had thought of the GPS capabilities primarily in turns of mapping and turn by turn directions, however the iPhone 2.0 firmware and the iTunes App Store have proved me wrong: location based services can be so much more.

A rash of location based applications have sprung up, and to my surprise they are all amazingly useful. Loopt provides a service similar to Dodgeball or BrightKite allowing users to check in with their friends and see what’s up but it improves upon it’s predecessors by being entirely automatic. Users can set up contacts and determine what level of location awareness they want to grant to each of these contacts and then view the location of their friends on a Microsoft Virtual Earth powered map. By updating your location without having to search for a location or manually enter one in the use of Loopt can be quick and simple – open the app, check what’s up, and get on with your day.

Other less flashy uses of the location services on the iPhone 3G don’t fail to impress. Even something as simple as a weather location can be improved by automatically knowing where you are. After getting used to weather applications, restaurant review sites, and other miscellaneous applications starting up defaulted to showing me information contextually relevant to my current location I’m struck by how “dumb” the non-location aware web is. Somehow it now seems downright primitive to have to enter my zip code into a web form to view movie times.

The downside to the iPhone 3G
While the App Store, Exchange Support, and location based services are impressive the new iPhone 3G and iPhone 2.0 firmware still have their less rosy facets. The 2.0 firmware lacks the rock solid stability of the 1.1.4 firmware I had been using previously. My iPhone has randomly rebooted 4 times in the last two days – usually in association with one of the App store downloaded applications. Luckily this is likely just some growing pains with the new 2.0 firmware and hopefully a patch will be delivered soon which resolves the stability issues I’m seeing.

In addition to the crashes the iPhone 3G has a fraction of the battery life that the 1st generation iPhone had. This is undoubtedly the fault of the addition of 3G and GPS. I’ll have a more complete idea of how big the impact is after a few more days of usage, but I certainly have seen a reduction. Yesterday while out and about I was torturing my iPhone with 3G data and GPS usage tacking our groups progress through downtown and Greenlake using the Google Maps application. In less than 2 hours I had lost 60% of my battery life.

I’ll be the first to admit that using both the 3G and GPS radios simultaneously is likely the worst case scenario but it’s frustrating to see the battery drop so quickly given the stellar battery of the 1st generation iPhone. Luckily if it gets to be more of a problem than 3G is worth I can turn off the 3G radio and push mail to theoretically get the same or better battery life that I’m used to in exchange for losing out on the increased speed.

Final thoughts
While Apple and AT&T faltered with a very rough launch with activation server failures the iPhone 3G hardware combined with the iPhone 2.0 software make for a very big change to the mobile market as a whole. Apples vision of the iPhone being the personal computer of tomorrow is starting to show through the smoke and mirrors. The iTunes App Store will allow developers freedom to create amazing new experiences, and the well implemented support for Microsoft Exchange will help the iPhone venture into the enterprise and tap the booming market for business-oriented smartphones.

When society really ends? The day they do this with bacon.

Answer: the bacon chocolate martini at the Capitol Club, Capitol Hill, Seattle.

Bless the Capitol Club, and bless Ali and TB for doing dinner with me last night at the Capitol Club. Good luck gals – twins on the way!

Update: A few days after posting this I’ve gotten a couple of emails asking for more details so here they are. The bacon chocolate martini is far from a martini – it’s not crisp nor light. It’s thick, heavy, and delicious. In fact, think of it more as a dessert than as a cocktail. The Godiva chocolate liquor used gives an almost milkshake like texture to this rich sensual delight.

The drink itself is more focused on the chocolate than the bacon. The bacon infused vodka adds more of a bacon note to the drink than an overwhelming bacon flavor. The candied bacon garnish is a sweet finish and tastes delicious dipped in the chocolate between nibbles. The Capitol Club was smart to start with maple cured bacon and then candy it – the ultra sweetness added by this process works perfectly with the natural salty flavor of the bacon when combined with chocolate.

I’ve been back in the USA for about 36 hours and I’m finally pretty much caught up on sleep and free of jet lag. As great of a time as I had in Berlin I’m quite glad to be home. I’ve finally got the last of the photos from the trip that are worth posting uploaded to my Berlin photoset on Flickr.

The HP event was actually really fun and informative to attend. To be honest I was a little worried that it would be a pretty mundane event announcing 5% faster this, and 8% smaller that but my fears turned out to be unfounded. HP launched both a massively improved Touchsmart as well as the stunning and lustworthy Voodoo Envy.

Another one of my 101 goals is completed and I’m left with a desire to return to Europe and explore more of what it has to offer.

HP has put us up in the Concorde, a beautiful 5 star hotel in the West German town center. It’s a great location which makes walking hither and yon an easy task. As busy as I’ve been I’ve taken every effort to get out and explore, taking photos along the way. I’m way behind in posting those photos, but I’ll try to catch up in the next few days and get another batch uploaded to my Flickr stream.

Ciao for now – off to get ready for the first day of interviews.

The Sparkasse bank, Berlin, Germany.

Right click and ‘Save link as’ to get the full size originals suitable for use on your iPhone.

I primarily use Photoshop for my image editing work and this process will be easy if you have Photoshop and are comfortable using it. It’s a very simple process and could be completed with virtually any image editor, although ones that can read Photoshop (PSD) files will make it easier to import the template discussed below. If you don’t want to spend money on a photo editing application GIMP is a free option that offers a decent interface and lots of tools to experiment with.

The first step of the process lies ahead: selecting the image to use. Ideally images should fit into one of two categories. These images have either a uniform simplicity, or a design flow that works with the iPhones overlaid controls.

The first type of image that works well has a uniformity to it. Because of the user interface controls partially obscuring the locked iPhone wallpaper images that focus on color or texture will work very well for this as obscuring a part of this kind of image does not hide key aesthetic elements. This kind of image is great for capturing a favorite color or surface while not adding distraction to Apple’s clean and minimalistic design.

A simplistic background

The second type of image that works well are images with a central focal point that is well buffered by simplicity. As the top and bottom of the iPhone are obscured by the overlaid controls having an image which can appreciated from the lower than center portion of the viewport on the lock screen, and with a background or less important top and bottom that are not critical to the aesthetic appeal of the image.

When taking photos for use as an iPhone wallpaper consider using a very narrow depth of field to direct interest to the center area of a vertical shot. Alternatively for a bolder look consider incorporating strong design elements such as bright angular sections of color. Remember that although the top and bottom will be obscured the image will still bleed through the overlay and provide some visual impact.

A more visually complicated sweet spot

Once an image is selected I use the iPhone template pictured below to help me compose it for the iPhone. I found this template on the Mac Rumors forum in this thread. Full credit goes to TheSpaz who created the awesome resource and shared it with the world.

The template is free to download and comes in the form of a PSD template with each element set up in a separate layer with the correct opacity. This template makes it easy to drop an image into the background layer and compose it to look its best on the iPhone.

As your source image is likely much larger than 320×480 pixels you will have to transform the image down to size. By using Photoshop’s free transform option on the layer you can adjust both the scaling of the image, as well as drag it around to ensure that the portion of the image you want visible is perfectly framed by the overlays.

The shot being used in this particular tutorial was taken with a Lensbaby, a lens that adds a significant amount of blur and vignetting away from the center of the screen. This effect helps draw the eye into a subject and simplify the background making it ideal for use in creating iPhone wallpapers. If you have an image you really like, but that does not work well with the overlays due to visual distractions consider vignetting the image in photoshop by gently blurring or darkening the top and bottom edges to draw the eye to the center of the composition.

Because the iPhone displays bright colors so well I usually find that bumping up the saturation of an image 4-8% adds a bit of pop to the wallpaper. A slight bit of sharpening with the unsharp mask filter often helps more detailed images retain clarity on the iPhone’s densely packed pixels. Both of these steps also help make the image look it’s best once it is saved out of the Photoshop format and into either a JPEG or PNG image.

Once you are happy with how your image looks within the preview offered by the template you are ready to save the image and put it on your iPhone. For this process you don’t want the templates overlays added so hide all of the overlay layers leaving your resized and cropped photo and any adjustment layers as your final image. From the file menu select ‘Save for Web & Devices’ to compress your final wallpaper down. I usually save my wallpapers as 32bit PNG images, however JPEG format backgrounds will work just as well.

Save the wallpaper with a recognizable name into the location where you have iTunes set to sync photos from. The next time you sync your iPhone the image will be synced into the iPhone’s library. From there you can view the image with the Photos application and then click the export scarab at the bottom of the screen to select that image for use as your wallpaper.

If you are interested in the image above the version saved without the overlays suitable for immediate iPhone use is here. You can also get the original PSD file here including all the layers, adjustments, and overlays used to create this.

As you can see the box that arrived is not terribly big. Even my wee EeePC is larger, and both are dwarfed by the 15″ Macbook Pro they alight upon. I immediately rip the box open with the only sharp implement handy.

Obviously I need a better sharp implement for my desk, or at any rate one less dangerous. Note to self: pick up giant serrated blade that will look good on a glass desk.

To help elongate my personal mysterious something experience both something’s came individually wrapped. Within seconds I had ripped into my smaller something, eager to divulge it’s contents.

A box! A tiny black box! Heart contain thyself. The box is constructed from pleather-clad cardboard and proclaims ‘Di Capri’ in embossed silver letters. What could be inside?

Cufflinks! Reasonably well put together and styled cufflinks at that. Luckily blue is my favorite color, and rectilinear forms are my favorite shapes. Worth the $10? For something #1 an enthusiastic yes. But what could the other (and ominously larger) something be?

This is either something fantastic, or something horrific.

It would seem the latter: something horrific yet delightfully soft. Either this is my new lounge wear, or the best white elephant gift for the upcoming holiday season. Worth the $10? For something #2 the verdict is a not so definite perhaps. It should be worth noting that the Something FAQ even specifically calls out the scenario of a feminine something going to a (somewhat) masculine guy so I can’t say I wasn’t warned.

End verdict: the Something Store gets a thumbs up in my book. Don’t bet the farm on them with their specifically random product delivery but for a fun way to blow $10 that’s likely less damaging to your liver than an evening out on the town check them out.

For a few more pictures of the Something Store unboxing extravaganza check out my Flickr set on the topic.

I guess not everyone has to be into zoos. Personally I don’t much find animals interesting. Sure I love Skype and having him around is a blast, but I enjoy his companionship rather than a fascination with his non-humanness. From a photographic perspective zoos don’t really do it for me because of the cages and glass – I far prefer getting up close and personal with my subjects, really interacting with them to get the perfect shot.

Oh well, I had fun, learned something about myself as an adult, and avoided heatstroke for another day. All in all a positive way to spend a Saturday afternoon even if I won’t repeat the experience.

Although I’m exhausted today thanks to an evening of night photography with Alissa, it was totally worth it. The idea begun ages ago when she pointed out the shadows cast by the wiring shown in the above photo and ended up being one of my 101 goals. Alissa best captured the beautiful shadows better than I did, but I really enjoyed the evening and the shots that I did get.

Time to get more coffee – I’m too old for this whole staying up late thing!

A sunset inspired photo from my downtown jury duty adventures last week. This is from a giant wall of red glass downtown. I’m also a fan of this photo of a very different part of the same building but red point is my favorite of the two.

Unfortunately I’m come to realize just how unorganized my photos were in iPhoto and am being forced to go on a holy reorganization quest – luckily a not quite as monumental now that I have Aperture to help me out. As a bonus I’m finding lots of old photos that with a little tweaking come out great. It’s like finding rough jewels in a mine, only I don’t have to get all dirty and sweaty – I can just dig away at my desk.

A new entry into my series of Two Union Square

Having caught up my stress levels are slowly returning to a more manageable level. This is a good thing as my health tends to suffer when I get too stressed out and in a case like this getting sick would only increase how far behind was. I’m starting to get more energy back and feeling more social as a result. Traskpro development may slow down slightly in the coming weeks if I end up being out of the house more when not at work.

I even found the time to take a few photos in the last few days. The above shot of Mike being Mike was taken from joining him, Cyn, and Charlotte at Cal Anderson park for some impromptu picnic play this morning. I’m also a fan of this new addition to my sticker series, and to this shot from the Pink Parasol – a cute little boutique a couple of blocks from my house.

While at the Leopard launch last night Mike picked up an 8Gb 3rd generation iPod Nano for his daughter. While over at their house this morning I was amused to see he was having trouble registering the Nano. Every time he tries to sign in with his Apple ID he gets the puzzling error “This person record requires harvesting.” (click the image above for a full sized view).

While I’m sure it has a valid technical meaning it’s a strange message to show to an end user. It almost makes me wonder – what kind of harvesting is Apple talking about here, a kidney or a crop?

Shortly after putting the finishing touches on my glowing review of Skitch for Gear Live I was fooling around and created this meta-skitch recursive image. Oh the idle joy’s of modern computing! Seriously though – check out the Skitch review, it’s one of those apps that you likely haven’t heard of yet won’t be able to live without once you try it. If you want a beta invite follow the instructions on the review for an opportunity to win one from me. You might also want to check out the Skitch website or my expose-screengrab experiment with Skitch.

“meta-skitch” by sparktography

Yesterday brought the marriage of Akiva and Shae in a beautiful ceremony. Attending was an interesting experience for me as this is the first Jewish wedding I’ve ever attended. While I didn’t directly understand any of the Hebrew prayers or blessings it was still fun to observe. I was very touched by how emotional Akiva got – he was shaking during the ceremony, and you could tell it really was a bit overwhelming for him.

The photo above is my favorite couples shot. I also really liked this shot of Eric, my capture of Shawna’s back, and this trippy twin-like shot of Troy. For all photos from the wedding check out my Flickr set of their wedding, or check out their Flickr wedding pool where hopefully other guests will also post some of their photos.

Congrats guys – myself and all your friends are wishing you the brightest of futures and the best of lives together!

I did a little work on some old photos tonight to work them up as Apple iPhone wallpapers. I ended up selecting two of them as my favorites, and am posting them here as a triptych with sunlit frond which I posted about two weeks ago. They were all selected for their central composition, and color pallets to go with the frosted grey and blue popups that appear on the homescreen. All three of them have been resized to 320×480 pixels from the original version and I adjusted the colors to look their best on the iPhone screen.

To set one of these as your iPhone’s wallpaper click the thumbnail above, then save the origional version from the pop-up to your hard drive. Save it to the location your iPhone syncs photos from (the folder of your choice on Windows or a Mac, or into iPhoto on Macs) and sync it to your iPhone. Once it’s there you can select it by clicking on Settings then Wallpaper to get to your photo library then selecting the photo of your choice.

“Chain link iPhone wallpaper” by sparktography
“Sunlit frond iPhone wallpaper” by sparktography
“Contrail to God iPhone wallpaper” by sparktography

Further experimentation with my 20mm lens. This lens makes it much easier to work with reflections than the lensbaby did. I’m going to have to try this shot again at a higher fstop to make both the primary subject and the reflection be in sharp focus, but for now I’m really happy with the hypnotic effect. Image inspired by Myla Kent.

The long weekend is at an end – I wish I could take tomorrow off as well, but when work calls I unfortunately must answer. Hopefully I’ll be able to take another long weekend soon enough.

“Many things are happening” by sparktography

Toys you say? Why yes – I’ve been playing the good consumer and picked up a few things in the last couple of days. Yesterday I picked up a Canon EF 20mm f2.8 lens for my camera from a co-worker. It’s a fun lens, but I can tell I have a lot of learning to go with it. I’m so used to using 50mm lenses (both my EG 50mm f1.4 lens and my Lensbabies) that it’s almost a little disorienting to use. Below is the first shot I processed (and my favorite from todays shots), taken at the Seattle Asian Art Museum in Volunteer Park.

While out and about I dropped by the Apple Store to claim my $100 store credit for being an iPhone early adopter. I had been looking at the V-Moda Vibe Duo earbuds and with their $99 price tag it worked out to being quite the steal when I factored in the store credit – I paid about $8 out the door once tax was added to the purchase price. I wrote a quick review of the Vibe Duos so check it out!

“Ironwork” by sparktography